Gratitude (28 page)

Twenty

Szeged – August 25, 1944

IT WAS
10:08
WHEN ISTVAN ARRIVED
at Mr. and Mrs. Brunsvik’s house, a mere fifty-five minutes since he’d knocked on Piroska’s door, not too late to call under the circumstances. They were old patients who’d once come to him for help, could pay him only with chicken and dumplings or baked beans. Now he was coming to them. It was not too late. He’d recovered some of his confidence, felt he could tap sharply on the dark window.

The light came on quickly. Istvan met Mrs. Brunsvik at the door rather than greet her at the window where she naturally went first. When she opened the door, she shrieked and slammed it in Istvan’s face. A second later the light was out. Istvan rapped again on the wooden door. No one answered. Now he slapped at the door. The light flashed on again.

He heard her voice through the door. “Dr. Beck. You’ve been gone. You’re dead. Marta told us.”

“Mrs. Brunsvik—”

“You’re a ghost. You…” She couldn’t finish. He could hear her gasp. He was afraid he’d harmed her, made her faint.

“Mrs. Brunsvik, are you all right?” She didn’t answer. He heard more footsteps, agitated shuffling inside. “Mrs. Brunsvik, I need to speak to someone. I need to come inside, but I won’t stay.”

“You can’t come in.” It was Mr. Brunsvik’s voice now.

Then hers again. “Oh, saintly Mary, what have I done to deserve this? What have I done to bring the Angel of Death upon us. Praised be your name, sainted Mary; praised be your blessed incarnation.”

“Mr. and Mrs. Brunsvik, I won’t stay. I’m hungry. It’s been—” he stopped himself. “I’ll go right away, I promise. No harm will come to you.”

Mrs. Brunsvik wailed with Mr. Brunsvik by her side. Istvan waited. He glanced all around him at the dark windows. He felt a wind blowing; he sensed the dampness now in the air, even through the warm sweater. He checked his appearance, looked down at himself foolishly to see the wind yodelling down his Alpine valley, wanted to be sure he was presentable—Istvan, the friendly ghost, Istvan, the amiable Angel of Death.

The door still didn’t open. They were quiet now, waiting for him to go. He could feel their anxiety, was a greater criminal for drawing attention to their house than a burglar or kidnapper would be, a criminal who could bring death to people who hadn’t intended to finish life so abruptly.

He was about to withdraw, had resigned himself to their verdict, when the door flew open again and old Mr. Brunsvik was upon him with an iron skillet, banging him on the shoulder, hitting hard. Istvan fell forward to the ground and covered his head. He took another blow to the back, which clanged, and another to the fingers covering his head. The blows rang around the neighbourhood.

Istvan wanted to throw off sparks like flint. He wanted to become the preternatural creature Mrs. Brunsvik had thought he was when he first knocked, wanted to dissolve from this dimension rather than take blows from the very skillet the couple had used to cook up the dumplings and beans they brought to him in payment for repairing their smiles, brought like offerings from supplicants.

The blows ceased. The door slammed. The light went out again. His breath had been knocked out. He hoped a rib hadn’t been broken, felt a sharp pain in his back as he tried to move. He looked all around. A light had come on in a house two doors down. Istvan would have scrambled away, but he needed to get back his breath. One minute more, that was all.

The Brunsviks’ door opened swiftly and two objects were flung at him, one striking his tender back. He lifted his head to see that one of the projectiles was an apple. He groped around and found the other, something gritty. A potato. New offerings. He put these in his pockets.

He pulled himself to his knees. He needed to get away. He could feel jagged pain at the end of each breath and knew he couldn’t run. He checked the light in the neighbour’s window and saw a figure there but doubted he or she could see him. He didn’t want the authorities called. He had to move on. He could feel the Brunsviks still on the other side of their dark door, listening for his next move. He rose and tottered over several front yards and a hundred steps away he slowed to catch his breath.

All was quiet. He had to make one last stop in the district, one last attempt to pry open the heart of a stranger. The only other person he could reasonably reach was Anna Barta, the woman who’d made it possible for him to discover
The Trial
, knowing the book was banned, risking her own safety. She was a better bet, even though calling upon her was the greatest risk. Anna would quickly surmise where he’d been holed up—or, if not, where he
would
be holed up.

Istvan remembered Marta’s description of Anna’s place, here in the northwest corner of the city, a red stone house smaller even than theirs, a house on Arany Street, the so-called “Golden Lane,” a lane so narrow that if Anna kicked up half the fuss the Brunsviks had, Istvan would have to dash home as fast as his injured rib would allow. Istvan remembered that the flower shop Anna used to run was directly across from her house. She used the shop now to dispense food stamps and gossip, but he’d be able to identify it still by a sprig of bronze fig leaves over the door.

It took Istvan less than half an hour to work his way over to Golden Lane. Some of the houses had been built directly into the arches of ancient walls that might once have been part of the palace of King Mathias. It was here that late-Renaissance goldsmiths created their royal pieces and plied their wares, and it was here that writers and artists moved in, as the years passed, to replace the poor of the nineteenth century, though they were just as poor. Marta said that according to Anna the great poet Sandor Petofi and his father once stayed in one of these little houses. Everyone who lived here spoke of this greatest of all visitors. Istvan decided that nationalism could be as parochial as a street sometimes. If this little place were where the almond had been discovered, they would always have to have almonds here, even if they were forbidden. If it were where light was discovered, they would always have to have light, show them who they were. Maybe he could one day provide Tower Town with its own claim to glory: the World’s Longest Lasting Fugitive resided here until he was killed one day with a skillet; the World’s Last Jew thinly prowled this neighbourhood with the World’s Last Half-Jewish Cat, perversely named Smetana. It was said the Jew controlled Two Beams of Light like a Baton Twirler, the Only Specimen to have been so Peculiarly Gifted in History.

Golden Lane was as narrow as could be. Those who built it never anticipated modern vehicles. It was easy, even in the dim light, to find the bronze fig leaves and to look directly into Anna’s little row house opposite, red stone as promised, the only one, Number 16. The door was too low for Istvan to walk through without stooping. He wanted to get in—get in or get caught.

He took a deep, splintered draft of dark air as he stood before the door. The houses were far too close together. What would they be thinking their Anna was up to if they heard her talking at this hour? Would they not want to know, want to check?

He raised his hand to knock on the irregular goblin’s door but turned first to look at the flower shop, the food-stamp depot. He would make this last stop as quick and painless as he could. He tapped so quietly, he was sure he wouldn’t rouse a mouse, but he did rouse Anna, who must have slept like one. He saw a match flare through the window, followed by the dim glow of a lantern, and then Anna herself appeared at the window, peering out at him. She could make out little more than a tall, thin man, but decided to take a chance, as he had.

She opened the door more widely than either of his previous hosts. “I’m Istvan Beck,” he whispered.

She gasped, put a hand up to her mouth, held the lantern high, so each could see the other’s face. To his astonishment, she yanked him into the house so quickly he banged his head on the doorframe. She checked around outside, eased the door shut and looked at him some more, continuing the gasp as long as it was possible to draw it out. He felt his hair brushing the ceiling, felt the stab of the rib in his back.

The room served both as kitchen and bedroom, with a stove in the middle and two beds on either side of it against the walls. She sat on one and urged him to sit on the other. She then changed her mind and joined him on his bed, where she could see him better.

“You’re Marta Foldi’s Dr. Beck?”

He nodded solemnly.

“Where have you been?” she asked.

He shrugged his shoulders. “Around,” he said.

“
Around?
She’s been worried sick about you. She went to work for another doctor in
your
office—did you know that?”

He hesitated but shook his head.

“Did you try Marta at home?”

He hesitated again, but this time nodded. He caught her looking at his sweater, wondered if she recognized it as Marta’s. He scratched his chest through the wool. He could feel his rib, though not as sharply in the warmth of the little room, and he could feel prickly dry stickiness below and remembered Piroska.

“She’s gone. They sent Marta away. Poor darling.” Anna took Istvan’s hand in hers and patted it. “She waited for you, poor thing. She may even have been in love with you, I can’t say for sure. She had that look. But she waited. She had a glow when your name came up—that I can tell you.” She looked at Istvan, who turned his head down and away. “I don’t know where they took her,” Anna said. “They’ve taken some people, and they haven’t come back. But it doesn’t mean they won’t. They must all
be
somewhere. You can’t just go off and kill that many people. I thought
you
were dead, too, and now look at you. You’re not. Here you sit, praise be to Jesus-Maria.”

She stood up and studied him in the light of the lantern. She was half his height, a perfect size for this little cabin. She was wearing a full-length flannel nightgown topped off with a heavy wool tartan jacket. To the outfit she’d added thick wool socks and men’s leather slippers. He thought, as he looked at her, that she was gazing at his sweater again and wondering. Instead, she stepped up to him and felt his shoulders and chest. “Look at you,” she said again. “Where have you
been
? Did they not feed you a thing?”

Istvan felt the apple in one pants pocket and the potato in the other. “Not very much,” he said. “I’ve been all over.”

She was already stoking up the wood stove, causing it to blaze. The room began to feel too warm. He hadn’t felt such warmth in years, hardly remembered the sensation.

“I’m going to have to feed you now before that meat of yours, whatever’s left of it, falls off your bones.”

“You have something for me to eat?” Istvan was conscious of how pathetically the question had come out. He tried to compose himself. He sat up straight.

“Of course I’ve got something to eat,” she said. “I’m the food-stamp person.” She smiled at him, and he smiled back. “I’ve got some nice stew,” she said. “Rabbit.” She went to the back, through a dark curtain, and returned with a pot. “A fella brought me some rabbits he shot some days ago. I’ve got far too much. I’m grateful to have you to share it. It’s got luscious stuff in it, too: potatoes, beets, parsnips, celery—um-hmm—imagine all that bubbling together in a pot to keep the rabbit company.”

Istvan’s mouth watered. He could barely maintain his dignity. His heart was beating a path out of his chest, looking for a new home. She didn’t ask more questions. She just said, “Go on in the back, there, and splash some water on your face. Wash up, feel free.” She was pointing to the curtain. She bent down, doubled right over, and from beneath the bed fished out another pair of men’s leather slippers. “Take off those shoes of yours. Put these on. Go, wash up.”

He did what she told him and set his shoes just under the bed he sat on, their noses poking out still. He put on the slippers and stepped through the charcoal grey curtain to the back, where a little water closet greeted him on one side and a cool pantry on the other. Another lighted lantern awaited him in the water closet. He looked at himself in the mirror, saw his gaunt face repeated there. He had the eyes of a wren, quick, dark and alert. He felt he’d travelled from Outer Mongolia and finally come to rest in the land of his keepers, felt he could play the role she’d imagined for him with ease. He even found himself hoping, as he brushed his teeth with his finger and some baking soda he’d found in a jar by the sink, that Marta would reappear from some obvious place the way he had.

Istvan stepped out from behind the curtain. The aroma of the stew and the light of the lamp must have rung out over the neighbourhood. He paused where he stood, watched small Anna set out a nesting table for each of them—a cup and saucer for her, a great bowl, a spoon and a crust of bread for him—and he was overtaken with feeling, considered retreating again to the water closet.

She felt his presence behind her. “Sit on your bed,” she said, pointing, urging—
his
bed. “Sit, go on.” She turned to make sure he was doing it. She had the scheming eyes of a fox, but he felt sure they’d be scheming on his behalf now.

She looked back at her stew and tasted it. With a full mouth she said, “The Russians are going to be here.” He didn’t answer. “You must know that,” she went on. “Maybe you brought them with you.” She laughed heartily. “The cockroaches have come to drive out the shits.” She laughed again uproariously, pleased with herself. He tried to laugh as she took his bowl and ladled out a steaming helping of the stew. “Anyways, maybe you didn’t bring them, but you’re here with us now. You made it home—that’s what counts.”

Home
, she’d called it. The word seemed too corny to be true, the place too warm, the steaming bowl too fragrant. But surely even interlopers had a home. Even cosmopolitans had a resting place. A watering hole. A hitching post. Even rapscallions. Even dentists with renegade noses and telltale surgery scars.